Doctor Strange director Scott Derrickson provided some more details about why he chose to leave the sequel, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
Back in January 2020, Derrickson took to Twitter where he announced, “Marvel and I have mutually agreed to part ways on Doctor Strange: In the Multiverse of Madness due to creative differences. I am thankful for our collaboration and will remain on as EP.”
Derrickson did not provide any details on what those creative differences were at the time.
He had previously shared on Twitter just a month earlier, “You can make a bad film from a good script, but you can’t make a good film from a bad script.”
“You can make a bad film from a good script, but you can’t make a good film from a bad script.” — David Lean pic.twitter.com/N0FlbSLSqF
— N O S ⋊ Ɔ I ᴚ ᴚ Ǝ ᗡ ⊥ ⊥ O Ɔ S (@scottderrickson) December 17, 2019
Speaking with The Playlist’s The Discourse podcast Derrickson shared, “All I can say is that what we said publicly is exactly the truth.”
He elaborated, “We had real creative differences. You know, the movie I wanted to make and how I wanted to make it was different than–it was just increasingly obvious that we were pulling against each other.”
“And that’s how you make a really bad movie, I think. When the producer or the studio and the filmmaker are making different movies, you end up with a monstrosity and, you know, that’s why I had to bounce,” he declared.
Derrickson went on to detail that his vision for the film was “a genuine horror fil of sorts” and it was going to be an “extreme departure from the first film.”
Writer C. Robert Cargill made that abundantly clear back in March 2018 during a Q&A following a screening of Doctor Strange in Austin, Texas where he revealed the villain of the sequel was supposed to be Nightmare.
He also shared, Marvel movies work in threes. They also work outside of their threes. Some of the better Marvel films have more than one villain in them. Me and Scott have not laid the groundwork for it but what I can say is that I have a feeling that whatever Nightmare is involved with, Baron Mordo, being somebody who considers himself the defender of natural law will have something to do with it.”
Cargill also stated, “That’s the thing. If we do another film it’s going to be weirder than this one. That’s the only way we’ll do another one is if we get to get weird.”
Despite, stepping away from Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness over these creative differences, Derrickson said there was no bad blood between him and Marvel.
“Yeah, I went to the premiere. I’m still friends with Kevin [Feige] and everything with me and Marvel is really cool,” he shared. “They invited me to the premiere and I went. And I’m friends with Sam [Raimi]. I love Sam, so there’s no bad blood over that.”
What do you make of Derrickson’s comments on why he stepped away from Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness?